ED finds FEMA violations by firm indirectly controlled by Telangana Congress candidate Vivek

Hyderabad: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has found FEMA violations in the firms indirectly controlled by former MP and Congress leader Dr G Vivekanand and has launched investigation into alleged violations and other financial discrepancies in the firms linked to him.

Vivek, a businessman, had recently quit the BJP and rejoined the Congress. Prior to his return to the grand old party, he was the BJP's manifesto committee chairman. Vivek is contesting the Telangana polls from Chennur on a Congress ticket.

The development comes after the ED conducted searches under the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), 1999 at four locations in Telangana on Tuesday. The searches were conducted at the residences of Vivek at Hyderabad as well as the office premises of Visaka Industries Ltd owned by him in Hyderabad and Vigilance Security Services Pvt. Ltd, a security management firm at Ramagundam. Searches were also conducted at his temporary place of residence at Hitech City, Mancherial.

The ED initiated the investigation on the basis of a reference from the Telangana Police to investigate a transaction of Rs 8 crore from the bank account of Dr G Vivek to M/s Vigilance Security.

ED investigation revealed that the bank account of M/s Vigilance Security was being used to circuitously transfer money with no real business rationale and that Vivek, his wife and their company Visaka Industries had transactions of more than Rs. 100 Crore with M/s Vigilance Security.

The entity declared mere Rs 20 lakhs as ‘revenue from operations’ in its latest balance sheet whereas it reported assets worth Rs 64 crore, mainly in the nature of long term loans/advances. Since inception, credit and debit transactions in the company’s impugned bank account was found to be more than Rs 200 Crore, the ED said.

The investigation also revealed indirect control of Dr G Vivek over M/s Vigilance Security. The ED investigation further revealed, prima facie, FEMA contraventions by M/s Vigilance Security Services Pvt. Ltd. and its parent company Yeshwant Realtors, whose majority shares are held by a foreign national.

Prima facie, FEMA violations were also noticed in the incorporation of an entity by Dr G Vivek in a foreign tax-haven country. During the search operations, the ED recovered and seized digital devices and incriminating documents indicating suspicious/unaccounted transactions worth several crores as well as use of unaccounted cash in property deals.

Seized documents also revealed large scale Inter-Corporate Deposits (ICDs) within group companies having no legitimate business but holding huge land assets. Searches also confirmed the bogus nature of M/s Vigilance Security Services Pvt. Ltd. which was found to be non-existent at its declared addresses. Further investigation is under progress.